I spent my Sunday. I spent it completely. I zipped out of my house at 9:30 in the morning and crawled back in around 10:30 at night - and it was a day off. Cripes. I do have days that are slower - I do need to breathe - but for the most part, this is just the season of life I’m in.
As it was the first Sunday of the month, there was, of course, a contra dance involved. Generally, there’s time to catch a word or two here and there with your partner as you dance together up and down the line. A swing, or maybe an allemande, where you’re face to face for about eight beats, maybe more.
It was a little unusual when we struck up a conversation that lasted the entire dance, but I couldn’t let this guy off the hook. I’ve known him long enough to know some of his stories. He’s got some background with shows, folk music, and singer-songwriters. Apparently he has known some pretty famous folks from before they were famous. Ordinarily, this would not impress me in and of itself, but the conversation was enthralling, as you will find out:
We ended up getting into a discussion about FAWM and some of the finer points of being an effective singer-songwriter. I’ve had a lot of discussions about this. Here’s where it got interesting for me: this guy generally doesn’t like singer-songwriters.
And yet, he knows them well. He knows what works and what doesn’t, mostly through seeing a ton of what he doesn’t like.
At the end of the dance, I asked him if I could send him a few tracks here and there to critique however he saw fit. To my utter delight, I now have his business card.
Let's get something straight here: I will accept any comment anyone wants to make regarding my music. Gladly and gratefully.
But I will only actively seek comments from folks who A) know what they’re talking about and B) have the guts to be completely honest. And I think any serious singer-songwriter ought to consider who those people are in their lives, ferret them out, and actively pursue their feedback.
Obviously, I’m thrilled that folks feel so moved to compliment my music. That they take the time to encourage me. But I’m looking for the comments that tear everything apart - praise the good, but understand the why of it, and also point out the bad without fear.
It's a kind of mentorship - you go into it with the understanding that the intent is not to tear down, but to build up. Sometimes building up requires tearing out a rotten board or two. You don't have to be embarrassed about it.
The bottom line: If you don’t have a good song to begin with, no amount of production can improve it. If you want a good song, you have to become a student of songwriting. The world is tired of the same cliches and the same stories and the same beaten-to-death harmonic progressions.
(Or at least, I am!! Shoot!!)
as this post was completed at 5:45am, seems like you're about to spend this day "completely" as well - good points about music critique, I wholly agree and appreciate constructive comments as well. Break out of the box and make some music that stimulates the mind and heart together!
ReplyDelete@Matt Thanks! You and I, we're like a co-critiquing team, which I also love. We gotta write some more jams soon, friend.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the blog seems to think I'm on the west coast for some reason... definitely posted at 8:45...
I know what you mean about how a lot of people will just say "oh that sounds great" and not give you any useful feedback. I often feel that way about the various things I create. For example, I got a lot of feedback like that about my website RateTea, and it was pretty useless.
ReplyDeleteBut I've also found that some of the critical feedback can be useless. One thing that really bothers me is if someone gives me feedback that is either not possible for me to implement, or that I don't want to implement. For my site RateTea, I've gotten some advice that the "name sucks", paired with recommendations to buy other names (which, incidentally, corresponded to domain names that were already taken). A few people have given me advice that I "should sell tea" on the site. No no no.
I like offering critiques of music. But I like it for a strictly selfish reason, I like hearing more of the music I like and less of the music I don't. Often, I think my advice would be bad for other people to implement because not everyone has tastes like mine.
To me, the advice is usually the same: make it more harmonically complex and have a lot of complex rhythms and/or contrapunctal things going on. Some of the people at Oberlin would play at contras in a jazzier sort of style, with some interesting chord substitutions (it's natural when you get people who also play jazz) and I really miss it. My brain just loves harmonic complexity, and without it, I eventually just start tuning music out. I think any type of music can be taken in that direction though. But when I think of the types of music I like most (Baroque, Be-bop Jazz, Puerto-Rican Salsa) they correspond to the types where this sort of harmonic complexity has been developed really deep, and there's either a lot of counterpoint, very complex rhythms, or both.
Ahh I meant "pretty useful" in the first paragraph but it won't let me edit it.
DeleteYeah, you have a good point. I will admit openly that some critique is useless. I think it helps to develop critiquing/mentoring relationships with people you trust that will stay with you for a longer haul.
DeleteI don't think your advice would necessarily be bad just because you think your tastes are finicky. I think a critique is basically a way of saying "here's my perspective." The artist obviously doesn't have to agree. But they might like some of the things you said. They have the right to take what they want from your critique, just as they gave you the right to say what you felt about it. But having the opportunity is still important!
I totally get it about harmonic complexity. Lately, in jams with other musicians, I've tried to teach my songs and it takes forever, mostly because of this desire not to use the same four chords as everyone else. In fact, even listening to too much folk music is dangerous because I've gotten to the point that I can tell (for guitars) what a chord is just by listening to it - my brain I guess is just calculating the intervals between the notes in the chord - gah :)